Modern electronic circuits are becoming increasingly smaller as the size of components forming such circuits steadily decreases. The cost of such electronic circuits is also steadily decreasing as new manufacturing techniques improve the yields and reliability of such circuits. As a result, increasingly sophisticated electronic circuits are being placed inside a variety of electronic devices, such as cell phones, digital cameras, smart appliances, and electronic toys. Current electronic toys include electronic circuitry which causes the toy to exhibit a variety of different behaviors, such as talking, walking, flashing lights, displaying information to a user, or exhibiting emotions like being happy or sad.
In a typical electronic toy, the electronic circuitry includes a memory that stores data that defines various pre-programmed behaviors. The electronic circuitry utilizes the stored data, which may include programming instructions to be executed by the electronic circuitry, to cause the toy to exhibit different behaviors. The data stored in the memory typically cannot be altered, which precludes the addition of desired behaviors after the toy has been assembled, and requires more memory as more behaviors are included. To allow the behaviors exhibited by a toy to be changed, however, the electronic circuitry in some toys includes a communications port, such as a Universal Serial Bus (USB) port, which allows new data to be transferred into the toy's memory to thereby provide the toy with new behaviors. In this situation, the communications port of the toy is coupled to a communications port of a computer which, in turn, transfers the desired data into the toy's memory. Because of the small size and relatively low cost, such a communications port can be used with small toys.
The inclusion of a communications port in the toy requires the use of a computer by the toy user, and thus requires at least a moderate level of technical savvy to properly perform the interconnection of the communications ports and initiate communication between the toy and the computer. Moreover, if the toy user must obtain the data to be transferred to the toy over the Internet, the user must have Internet access as well as the requisite technical knowledge to navigate the Internet and find the data sought, and thereafter transfer the data through the computer to the toy. Many times the toy user will be a child, meaning the technical ability to operate the computer and access the Internet may be lacking and thus require help from a parent or other adult. Moreover, the use of a communications port on the toy assumes the user has computer access, which may not always be true. Other alternatives for inputting data into a toy are possible, such as a keypad on the toy or a mass storage device like a floppy disk or CD-ROM drive in the toy. Such alternatives are not practical in most situations for a variety of reasons, however, including increased cost and size limitations of the toy.
Accordingly, there is a need for a simple method of transferring user-selected data to an electronic toy, smart appliance, or other electronic device without the need for using a computer.